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Perdóname por mi Mal Español (I’m Sorry for my Bad Spanish)

December 18, 2018 by Gwen

Updated on February 15th, 2021

I don’t usually have a hard time admitting that I don’t know the language. Italian? Nope. French? No. German? Nein. Russian? A few swear words courtesy of my best friend. But Spanish? I have this immense guilt about having to ask someone to switch to English. I think it’s mostly because I’ve had a lot of really great Spanish teachers in my life and I feel I owe it to them to be able to conduct basic conversations.  Also in Costa Rica, everyone is so darn nice.  I just wanted to be nice back, in their language!

For the first three days, I would panic everytime someone would ask me, ¿Cómo estás? Why? I have no idea. It was like my brain had fallen out of my head and the only Spanish left was “chicle en la boca” and “que sera sera”, two phrases that aren’t exactly helpful while ordering ceviche.  I could remember all of the present tense verb conjugations but that doesn’t do me any good if I can’t remember the verb!  It got to the point where I didn’t want to go to dinner because I didn’t want to struggle through the conversation.

By day four, I had fallen into a rhythm. I managed to translate a little for Andy when the owner of our AirBnB (who spoke no English) took us to see a sloth in a nearby tree.  Apparently “sleep”, “eat”, and “don’t touch it” are still part of my vocabulary.  No surprises there. 

On day five I managed to tell a grocery store cashier who apologized for her English that “usted Inglés es mejor que mi Espanol” (your English is better than my Spanish!). Maybe it is like riding a bike!  A bike a crashed into a tree when later that day I answered the dreaded ¿Cómo estás? with a heart felt “ca va bien!”  What?!  I don’t even speak French!

The last day of our trip I managed to have an entire conversation about purchasing gasoline including “can we pay with a credit card?” and a few pleasantries without google translate or a panic attack. I like to believe the attendant was in shocked by my beautiful accent while my gringo husband said gra-C-ass. It’s unlikely but let me have my delusions of grandeur.

All of this has brought to my attention just how much I really need to work on my language skills. I’m adding “really learn Spanish” to my 2019 goal list.  Dear Spanish speaking world:  I’m trying, and I’m sorry for my bad Spanish.

Does anyone have any suggestions for programs or apps that could help improve my Spanish?

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